"You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them" Maya Angelou

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The Black Hole

I have moments when I am feeling ok and positive and I believe that I am doing well. I can jump out of a plane at 13000 feet, face my ex-husband and believe in myself and my beauty and courage. I am strong and fearless and feel that I can conquer any and all the challenges that come my way.

Then suddenly everything changes; maybe I don’t get enough sleep, or I am criticised or my son has a tantrum and then my resolve shatters. I wake up with fear and insecurity again. I return to the Black Hole of being unmothered where I want to hide and be small and my voice doesn’t matter. I am angry with God, with people around me. In that dark moment I second guess myself and question decisions I thought I had made already. I am plunged again into a smaller version of myself.

How quickly the switch is made from feeling strong to feeling hopeless.

I know you will say, be gentle with yourself. Be patient. You are healing from so much and it hasn’t been that long. I am always running ahead of myself and wanting to be somewhere else. I want to heal overnight and never feel the darkness of the Black Hole again. I only want to feel the strength and confidence and be all ok all the time.

But alas, I know that the Black Hole will always be there and I could fall in at any time. But I am safe, the abuse is over and I am changing my life for the better in so many significant ways. I am at the wheel. I will always have that permanent essence, that unbreakable rock, which is me, and my inner mother who will never abandon me. She holds my hand and fans the flame I have within transforming it into a brilliant orange flame tinged with blue and yellow. The flame and the stone are there in those dark moments when I am plunged into the Black Hole. I am not alone and I have you my readers.

It’s been six weeks since my last counselling session and I am looking forward to going back this week. I am in no way ‘cured’. There is no cure from this.

I feel that too! I have been in therapy for about 15 months now. How much more will I need? But I think maybe its not something that can be fixed. It will always be there, we will always stumble and fall into that Black Hole but maybe we just get better at falling and we get up faster and more skilfully. I would like to believe that at least the more we feel the more we heal and that feeling the pain means we are releasing it!

I think for others challenges don’t overwhelm them because those challenges don’t induce a feeling of helplessness or hopelessness.
Force was used during childhood abuse. And by force, love was used against a child, turning it into a weapon for the attacker to satisfy his or her lust. Love was shattered, thrown away callously, without regard to a tender child’s love, spirit, trust and devotion. Shattered.
So how could that child grow? Yet she does. You do.
Yes, the everyday challenges bring me down to my knees, weak, vulnerable, and feeling helpless or hopeless. And I climb out again, and again. And we all do, yet it is much harder for those whose love was stolen and twisted into violence instead of love as a child.

In those times I don’t seem to recognize my strengths, yet they are there. I think that has to do with the way I had to separate from myself, that I don’t feel the strength and power when I really need it. But it’s there, and the formidable challenges when so young have developed my inner strength making me stronger because of it. You too!

You know that is amazing insight Patricia. I never thought of it before. Yes I don’t feel my courage my strength my beauty and many other things that are part of me because I had to spectate myself from myself as a coping mechanism. Putting some distance so that I could cope as a child. That makes so much sense

Welcome home! I’ve missed your voice! I’m always grateful for your reflective introspection. I used to be terrified of that black hole and that flick of the light switch where I can go from feeling good to bad in a nanosecond. It used to terrify me because the familiarity of the black hole was strangely comfortable. It was luring. Just a slight shift of my feelings was enough to spiral me into it. Sometimes I still go there and its a crushing, devastating place to be. Not only is it scary to be there but it feels like failure and defeat — which plays into our survivor all-or-nothing thought process. I would do anything to avoid being there and was terribly anxious. But I’m shifting — instead of hiding from it or being afraid of it, I accept it. As you write: “I know that the Black Hole will always be there and I could fall in at any time.” Instead of running from it, I’m trying to integrate it as a part of me. The whole-me. I don’t like it. I wish it wasn’t there in the shadows of my brain, but somehow knowing it’s there and talking to it like an old nemesis, or even better — an old coping mechanism no longer needed — I don’t feel like it owns me. I can feel when it starts to gurgle and I can just hold it, talk to it, even be baited by it for a moment, and then step away. Put it down. Say no thank you. I don’t need you anymore. The Black Hole will always be there but we can change our relationship with it. And maybe most importantly, on the days when we do slip in, we need to accept that too. There is always growth to be yanked from those moments. They are never failures if we continue our work. I’m a work in progress on this life journey. I’m filled with gratitude that you’re with me!

Thanks for taking the time to reflect on my post “The Black Hole” and for offering such great insight! I agree completely that it is an alluring place same as when you are a child and don’t want to see something scary, you cover your eyes or hide. As a child, for me it was a place to hide in and become invisible. It was a coping mechanism, but now as an adult it is not a place to take cover in but a place to delve in to feel the feelings that need to be healed sometimes, and sometimes it is a matter of choice to say that it is not the place that I want to go and step away!
Yes it does feel like failure there but we are doing the hard work and are open enough to go to the places that are difficult to go to.

I was having a black hole day today and I was so blessed as someone who promotes your blog liked a post of mine and so I was led to this site and your beautiful posts.

Its a powerful reminder that as far along as we go in healing we still have those deep dark days when we are sucked back into that hole for a time. It can feel so painful when we have had so many good days to see this darkness return and yet I do wonder if we didn’t know this pain would we value the good days as much?

Thank you! I agree completely, I think that we are able to heal by having those black hole days when we embrace more pain and heal even deeper levels of ourselves. And we emerge from these dark days it’s as if we are reborn.